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<h3 class="docSection1Title" id="454331-899">Introduction</h3>
<p class="docText">This book describes the programming interface to the Unix systemthe system call interface and many of the functions provided in the standard C library. It is intended for anyone writing programs that run under Unix.</P>
<p class="docText">Like most operating systems, Unix provides numerous services to the programs that are runningopen a file, read a file, start a new program, allocate a region of memory, get the current time-of-day, and so on. This has been termed the <span class="docEmphasis">system call interface</span>. Additionally, the standard C library provides numerous functions that are used by almost every C program (format a variable's value for output, compare two strings, etc.).</P>
<p class="docText">The system call interface and the library routines have traditionally been described in Sections 2 and 3 of the <span class="docEmphasis">Unix Programmer's Manual</span>. This book is not a duplication of these sections. Examples and rationale are missing from the <span class="docEmphasis">Unix Programmer's Manual</span>, and that's what this book provides.</p>

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